Strolling with a Friend - a photo on Flickriver

            This beautiful dirt road lined with poplars, still partially bare in the early Spring, leads to the farmstead called Mugnaga (which in the Milanese dialect is the word for "apricot"), a large farmstead producing milk, cheese, honey, corn, wheat, and other agricultural products (and hosting a nursery). It was still lockdown time, and I allowed myself a brief sunrise session while going to work. I was lucky enough to find a man and his dog strolling along the dirt road towards the farmstead, in the distance, bathed in the golden light.

In this area there are several traditional Padan farmsteads, which are still inhabited and active - in the Padan plain there are so many dead relics of our rural history... - some of them are fairly ancient, dating back from the 19. or even the 17. century and they are often protected as they have historical and/or artistic value. Italy is quite rich in cultural heritage but well, protection often means, say, that a building of interest cannot be demolished, but can be abandoned to its own (sad) fate. The people who are still living and working in these farmsteads are preserving the memory of generations upon generations of peasants who were the workforce of what had long been the most advanced agricultural region in Europe. They lived in the landowners' farmsteads and worked in the attached fields - families upon families who were payed-in-kind (milk, butter, corn, flour...) and were so poor that when they transferred from one farmstead to another the whole (and quite often numerous) family plus their scant belongings could easily fit in a cart.

I have obtained this picture by blending an exposure bracketing [-2.0/-1.0/0/+1.0/+2.0 EV] by luminosity masks with the Gimp (EXIF data, as usual, refer to the "normal" exposure shot), then I added some final touches with Nik Color Efex Pro 4. Raw files processed with Darktable.
My good old Hanhel tripod caused much trouble on that morning - I had to painstakingly offset against slight horizontal deviations between the five shots of the exposure bracketing, ranging from 3 up to 7 pixels. Luckily it was just a simple horizontal deviation, and I was able to compensate for it. I have just grabbed my new tripod (Rollei C6i carbon), can't wait for trying it! (Incidentally, I have just confirmed the rule that we talk about our poor tripods only when they cause trouble ;-))

Taken in: Italy / Lombardy / Gorgonzola / Gorgonzola (show map)

Taken on: March 30, 2021

Tags:

Italy

Italia

campagna

grass

trees

poplars

pioppi

rows

lines

filari

dawn

sunrise

early morning

rising sun

daybreak

serenity

colourful

colorful

field

agriculture

rural landscape

Nikon

D750

Nikkor

zoom

24-120 mm

the Gimp

Darktable

luminosity masks

poplar

exposure bracketing

light

road

dirt road

rush hour

peace

harmony

silence

connection

friendship

amicizia

friends

man

dog

golden light

sky

clear sky

early Spring

Nik Color Efex Pro 4

branches

rami

buds

leaves

bark

corteccia

trunks

rhythm

stroll

tripod

deviation

compensation

offset

Hahnel

Rolley « less

Sets appears in: • Sunrise

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Camera: Nikon D750, f/10.0, 1/60 sec, 46mm, ISO 100 (more info) (hide info)

Camera:	Nikon D750
Aperture:	f/10.0
Exposure Time:	0.017 sec (1/60)
Focal Length:	46mm
ISO:	100
Exposure Bias:	0 EV
Flash:	Off, Did not fire
Exposure Program:	Aperture-priority AE
Exposure Mode:	Auto
Metering Mode:	Multi-segment
White Balance:	Auto
Color Space:	Uncalibrated
Software:	GIMP 2.10.24
Show full info

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